Movement, Strength and Mounjaro - A Midlife Reset With Charlotte Barton

What happens when the woman who once completed Ironmans suddenly no longer recognises herself? 

In this open, honest and inspiring episode, physiotherapist Charlotte Barton shares her journey of menopause, injury, weight gain and rebuilding her confidence through movement, strength training and Hyrox.

From Ironman racing to pelvic health, muscle, longevity and the realities of starting again in your 50s, Charlotte combines expert insight with lived experience in a conversation that will challenge the way you think about ageing.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• The truth about muscle, menopause and longevity
• Simple ways to reduce injury risk as we move and age
• Why recovery, mobility and pelvic floor health matter more in midlife
• Charlotte’s  experience using Mounjaro as part of her lifestyle change

Whether you’re starting again, rebuilding after a setback, or simply looking for inspiration to move your body differently, this conversation will leave you feeling empowered to rethink what’s possible in midlife. 

Visit Charlotte's Website www.thelionclinic.com

Follow Charlotte on Instagram at  menopausephysio.triroxmum

Follow the podcast on Instagram:  @unshrinkablemidlfemoves

Find out more about Onika on Instagram: @lifeopenedup

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hi Charlotte, great to see you today. How are you? Yeah, I'm good, thank you. Good. So you are going to be talking to us today about quite a few things, but before we get going, tell us a bit about yourself.

SPEAKER_00 0:12

So I am 52, but I'm determined to be younger. I'm growing younger, not older. I am a physiotherapist, but quite unique in that I have a dual role. I am both a human physiotherapist and a techno physiotherapist. So I treat dogs and cats. I run my own business called the Lion Click. And I also work as a pelvic health physiotherapist working for a private healthcare company and do a bit of rugby physio beside for my children's rugby club. So that's my job in a nutshell. I am married with two teenage boys who are completely sports mad. And I have four spaniels, so I'm a bit dog mad and two cats. So yeah, crazy household. And that explains the animal background. Exactly. Yeah. I want to be a vet and actually did a degree first of all in agriculture and then got into vet medicine because of my background in sport. I'd had lots of physio myself for my various sporting issues when I was younger. And so the second best fiddle was physio. So I went on and did my physio degree after my agriculture degree, worked for human physio in the NHS for nearly 30 years, alongside doing some sports physio, because that's the year I thought I'd go into. But I actually ended up going to Pelvet Health. And then eventually did I'm asked to do my vet physio. It's quite a varied career and big career change. Though I did do bet physio when I was younger, I just did it part-time after COVID when I was an intensive care nurse for four months, which was a bit of a subchange of career, but not really much choice because we were redeployed. I then decided to complete career change and wanted to specialise in the vetap physio. So I went back into vetap physio. And so now that's my main job. And the humans are my minor job. Keep it flexible.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Which leads us nicely into what you're going to talk to us about. But before we get there, tell us a bit about your movement journey. What have you done historically that brings you up to today?

SPEAKER_00 2:13

So I've loved sport all my life. So I've as a kid played netball, cricket, swam, played tennis, and whenever we went on holiday, we would always do holidays where we would be quite active. So I was very lucky to have those opportunities as a child. And my mum was very sporty, and my dad was always going to the gym at five o'clock in the morning before he went to work. So I think as a family, I come from a family of four. Sport was always part of my life. I wasn't very good at sitting still as a child. In fact, I think I would rather do sport than work when I was at school. I loved team sports when I was at school. Went to university, played team sport there, I played hockey. At the end of my sort of six years at Unix, at the two degrees back to back, I was in Newcastle and I entered the Great North Run. That was my first long run. And really from that point onwards, I really enjoyed running. And once I started working in London, it was an easy thing to do because you could just go for a run before or after work. And the other thing I always used to do, I used to cycle everywhere in London. I refused to pay the prices for taxis. And I used to get frustrated by having to wait for buses and trains. So I used to ride my bike around London everywhere. Even if I went out clubbing, I would go on my mountain bike with my panures on my bag. Everyone would always laugh at me. Charlotte would cycle everywhere, get changed, and then cycle home again at the end of an evening at two o'clock at night. So yeah, that was me. Yeah, it wasn't really into high heels, I suppose, but liked going out and having a bit of fun with my friends. So yeah, that was sort of me going through my years at post-university. Then when I met my husband, I moved out to Hampshire, which is where he lived. And I don't quite know how I ended up doing it, but I took up triathlon. So swimming, biking, and running. I fitted in with work because I had long commutes to London for work, so I could train in the mornings before work and didn't have to rely on other people in the team. Then had my children and also had the kids went back to triathlon again. And I ended up going into the long-distance triathlon. So half iron man and iron man. I don't quite know I'm crazy. And over a period of about eight years, I started the Olympic distance triathlon and then went into half iron man. And I did 10 half iron lands in total. So that consists of uh 1.9 kilometers swim and then 90k on the bike and then a half marathon at the end. And I actually qualified for world champs in Nice in 2000. I mean that was kind of the pinnacle of that. And then didn't want to stop there and went, I've got to do a full Iron Man. Kobe got in the way, so that delayed it. And I did on man Portugal. So I did my full arm man. Oh, that was brutal, but I did it. Didn't have a really good time. I had a bit of a blip. I had meniscal tear in my knee, and I ended up having to have surgery on my knee, and I was changing jobs. And I had about 18 months when I basically didn't do much exercise. That delightful menopause, perimenopause age, and the weight just piled on. I've never been slim. I would describe myself when I was younger as normal to chubby, but always strong and fit, but never slim. Um, and then 18 months down the line of not really doing much exercise, spending most of my time sitting at the pool, watching my children swimming and playing rugby and doing all their various sports, I decided I really needed to knock this one on the head and get back into sport because actually that's what made me happy. Wasn't good for my mental health, not doing any sport, really wasn't. I sort of spiraled downhill doing no sport, slept badly, just didn't feel good at myself. And so I took up high rocks. That's how we found each other. Well, how done it doing high rocks. Well, my old coach from my Travelon days, she'd done a high rocks, and I sort of reached out to her and said, Oh, you know, I need a goal. And she said, Oh, you'd love high rocks. It's just like Tarathlon, that kind of community. She said, But you can do your running still, but it's easier to work with the kids and sport and the gym and stuff. So I said, All right, I'll give it a go. And I did my first high rocks race this time last year. So I went out to Barcelona with a friend of mine and we did Hyrux Open Doubles in Barcelona. She came from a CrossFit background, so was always very strong, whereas I was a runner, so at that point had lost a lot of fitness. And we did our first race, and that was kind of the start of my high rocks journey. I'm very goal-oriented, so I like to have something to aim for as honest, very compared to myself. And so I think that's probably drove me to just want to get better and better. Um, and then over the last year, I've done oh hang on, how much I've done. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, five.

SPEAKER_01 6:52

So it's your bag. You've got your bag down there, haven't you? Let's see the bag. Yeah, just about just about get it in there. And this is what I tell everybody about high rocks, because I'm two years in and I haven't done many this season because I haven't been well. But once you start, it's literally, it's just so addictive, isn't it? I think I did about nine or ten in my first year because you just start and you're like, oh, I can take a minute off, I can take two minutes off, and mine were like that, and it was it's like, no, I can do it.

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Yeah, exactly. And I think also part of the reason I ended up doing more than I probably would have planned, because obviously they're expensive, is that I always volunteer for the ones in England. And that that is so much part of it. The community that I have become part of by doing my works has just been amazing. You meet the same judges, you meet the same people. In fact, I even met a patient of mine on the wallboard judging, a pelvic health patient of mine, and we were literally standing next to each other, oh my goodness, Sean, how are you? Like evening a pelvic floor exercises? Yes. So yeah, and yeah, I started doing pro doubles more recently, which I really loved. And then, of course, I can't not mention Lock Queens and the amazing Caitlin, because that has just made it something where rather than just sort of being on your own, you just feel that wherever you go, there's somebody that you can meet up with. And that's why I met my race partner, Emma and I have had some couple of really good results, particularly the one recently. And actually, that has been amazing being part of that with Caitlin and her team. They're just so welcoming. And I love the fact that it's just such a mix of people. And as much as I'm competitive myself, I've always had a real drive to encourage others as well. I love just trying to get people to join me on the journey. That's just how I've always been in my sports, whether it's going on a ski holiday or going for a run or doing the marathon. I've done the London marathon three times, and many years ago, a fizzy I used to work with, and we were standing watching it, and I said to her, Do you reckon we should do the marathon one day? And she went, Oh god, I can't even run. And I went, why not? I said, I'll go out running with you, you know, it doesn't matter. And she went, Oh, okay then. And yeah, she did the marathon and we trained together. Yeah, I that's just me, I guess. I just love sharing my passions with other people.

SPEAKER_01 9:06

And it's hard not to when you experience the improvement and the difference and the transformation yourself, because I'm exactly the same. For me, it's high rock. That sport has shown me what I'm capable of and shown so many people what they're capable of. It's really intimidating. But once you have it, it's totally attainable.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

And I think the other thing I also would say, which is crazy, bear in mind I did half iron man to an iron man, and people go, Oh my god, you must be the fittest athlete. I was always injured. And I can honestly say now, having done high rolls, I am stronger than I ever was then, unless injuries, which I think, particularly being the age that I am, being I hate to say it middle aged, but that's essentially life, actually protective in the long term. You know, I do a physical job, I have two teenage boys, I'm very active day to day. My day-to-day life is very busy. And without a doubt, the high rocks training, so being in the gym, functional strength work, you know, farmers carries. I know we all go, oh, those flimming farmers carries, but actually that relates to being able to carry the heavy bags of shopping. Yeah. It doesn't matter whether you're 21 or 70. If you do things like farmers carries in the gym or you know, you're doing your squats, whatever, these are real-life things that keep you fit and healthy into later life. And obviously, as a physio, that's a huge part of what I talk about. Many of my friends, you get to your mid-50s and you start noticing that some of your friends look really quite middle-aged. And in general, they are the ones that just don't do regular functional strength. Some of them are actually quite good runners, but they don't do the strength work alongside it. And it just makes you realise how important it is. We cannot risk losing our muscle mass, losing our bone strength. This is the absolute key time. I know there's lots of young people that do high walks, and that's fantastic. But actually, what I love about it is that for the older athlete, if you're somebody who's always liked being competitive, you can compete in no age group. But if you're not into doing it being competitive just for yourself, that's fine too, because the benefits from the training are just so huge to just life in general and being able to keep yourself fit and healthy into later life.

SPEAKER_01 11:14

Yeah, definitely. And what you said about the injuries, I found that because my husband, he's competed for a long time in athletics. And when I went from basically nothing for six months to training and then ramping up from maybe twice a week to five times a week, he kept telling me, be careful you don't injure yourself. And like you, I haven't had any injuries from the sport and it's a lot on the body. Yeah. As you say, there's something about it and the type of training that protects us to an extent.

SPEAKER_00 11:39

Yeah, absolutely. And I know we say high wags, but obviously high walks isn't the only one, you know, hybrid racing in general, because it is combining fitness, movement patterns that essentially we require to stay strong, fit, and healthy through life. And yes, not everyone likes the running part of it, they're not runners, but hey, you can jog it or walk it if you really need to. It's not the end of the world. And of course, if you're an adaptive athlete, you can still do it, you just adapt those movements. Your wheelchair user, you still need to be able to do transfers out of your wheelchair onto your bed or when you travel. And actually, something like HiROX is a fantastic way of keeping you fit and strong, so you can still keep yourself strong and fit to be able to carry out your life despite your disabilities. So it's important for everyone.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Yes, that's so true. So talk to us a bit about everything in terms of the physiotherapy perspective, because I know you've just touched on it, but as we are discussing movement across a range of sports over the podcast episodes, how can you help us and advise us as middle-aged women to look after our bodies to ensure that we do reduce the possibility of injury as we start moving and doing things that we've never done before?

SPEAKER_00 12:52

I think the biggest thing when you are an older athlete is our recovery times. So we can still do achieve the same goals we want to in our sport. We can still see personal deaths, we can still improve, but we have to take on board that recovery time from both training and from injuries, if we do sustain injury, is longer. You know, as a 20-year-old, if you have a muscle strain or if you do a really big setting gym, you know, your day non-fit muscle soreness, your Dom's, you are going to recover so much quicker. You won't necessarily need so long to warm up. And if you do injure yourself, your body will heal a lot quicker. When you become older, unfortunately, the biggest thing is that every decade past I think it's 30, I should know the facts, you can lose up to 10% of muscle mass and what caused sarcopemia. That sounds depressing to think that happens, but actually you can stop it too. That's if you don't do anything. So it's even more important, and that's why I'm annual about it, that as an older athlete, that we continue to build muscle strength and maintain it. And when I say build muscle strength and maintain it, I'm not talking about doing things like body pump classes, and I'm not saying they're wrong, but if you're truly tried to build muscle and maintain muscle, you need to be lifting low reps, heavy weights. So as older athletes, we can lift heavy weights. Obviously, it's really, really important that we are taught how to lift them correctly, particularly if you're doing free weights rather than fixed weights. Obviously, fixed weights are a bit different. You've got a little bit more protective there because there's a machine, but that also means that you can compensate and not necessarily using the exact nostrils that you think you're using because, say, the weight's too heavy and you're doing a leg press, you might sort of arch your back and use your bum and basically try and compensate. Certainly in the gym, it's me in Winchester. They've got these machines called e-gym, which is actually a really good introduction to weight training, particularly for maybe the more sedentary athlete who's not done weights before or is a bit nervous to do them, and it adjusts it according to your weight, your age, your flexibility, your base strength length, and helps to basically build up your strength and your weights that you do over a period of time on various different machines. Personally, I wouldn't use it because I feel quite confident with weights, but I do think it's really important somebody who's doing weights the first time, or as an older athlete doing it, they definitely make sure that their form is good and that they build up slowly. As I said, we should be doing heavy weights and low reps, but you can't go straight into that. So we're much better off learning the technique with the very light weights and then building that up. And yeah, not everyone can afford to have a PT in a gym. I get that. You know, there are plenty of ways of doing it online or on Zoom or even just watching YouTube videos and things. If you've got good understanding, if you feel like you're progressing, then we can do it without having to have an expensive program. But equally, any of these gyms, if you're not sure how machine works, you can always ask when you go in there for somebody to help. Alongside the muscle mass, the other big thing for an older athlete who's also trying to maintain their muscle mass is their bone density. Particularly as we go into menopause and our estrogen levels drop, that's when we are at risk of developing either osteopenia or osteoporosis. Osteopenia is when our density of our bones is starting to be low and we're at risks. And osteoporosis is when we do actually have a low bone health score. Now, obviously, they're at risk groups. So somebody who has maybe gone through menopause early or has a very low body weight, or also has maybe gone through the menopause for surgical reasons like had hysterectomy early. And then there are some other at-risk routes as well that it can be the K Sport too, but we need to be maintaining our bone density, our bone strength. And so that is through doing impact exercise. So that doesn't mean you have to be a runner, it can be walking, but it's impact sport is where we are having to use our body weight with contact with the ground. And so it causes almost micro traumas, and the body has to then respond to it to build bone to maintain our bone strength. Obviously, running is something I love, but for a lot of people that's not what they would choose. And I will talk about pelvic law in a bit, but for some people that's another reason why they might not want to run or they've got a practicing injury because again, as we get older, particularly if you maybe were very sporty when you were younger, and you maybe played a sport that caused you to have an injury that meant you stopped sport or had surgery as a result of it, then you may not be able to do certain things because of that. So um, obviously, there's certain other sports people take up in older age about enjoying so people may have been tennis players and they take up things like paddle. Um, and what's the other one? There's paddle, and then there's the other one that's like paddle up and pick for the name of it. There's the two tennis sports. I know. Um yeah. And again, people enjoy more team sports, they're brilliant, you know, things like badminton. Those are all essentially impact sports, so it doesn't have to be, but they're movement, so you're changing direction, speed, so there's still you've got to be careful.

SPEAKER_01 17:43

That was interesting because I wouldn't have thought badminton was considered an impact sport.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

Well, you're on your feet and think about it, you're standing on your feet and you're moving from side to side, you're stretching, you're potentially jumping forwards. So, yes, I mean, obviously you could play doubles, it's less active, but you're still on your feet, you're still moving fast around a court. Obviously, there's different levels of playing, but essentially it's still a sport which involves being on your feet, so it's still impact. And of course, the other forms of cardiovascular sport, you've got things like your swimming and your biking, and they're really good for cardiovascular health, your endurance health, your heart health, so important to keep that circulation, but they don't have the same impact benefit. So it's a mixture of the cardiovascular sports that we need to make sure we have. So, yeah, I think across the board, those sports where your heart rate's going up, it's raised for a certain period of time are really important as well. So, again, when you're younger, if you went to play tennis with a friend or decided you were going out for a run or going to the gym, you just might go in straight away and start without warming up. As an older athlete, it's really, really important that we warm up. So our mobility and flexibility are huge. As we become older, our flexibility, our mobility definitely get impacted. So, where you might be able to reach behind your back to do something up, you might not be able to anymore. Or you used to be able to touch your toes when you reach forwards. Some people are more flexible than others, but definitely your viability and flexibility within your muscles and tendons does reduce as you get older. So having a good warm-up is really important. And when I say good warm-up, doesn't mean you start straight with stretches. That means you need to gently raise your heart weight first, even if you're doing weights in the gym. So that might be you do a brisk walk for five minutes, or an easy walk on a treadmill, or a jog on a treadmill, or easy on the bike, or maybe get on the rower for five minutes or so, then do some stretches. That is going to reduce your risk of having an injury. So it's really, really important that we still do our stretching and warming up, more so than when you're younger. And then I always try to say people at the other end, when you finish and you want to rush out the gym, even if it's just five minutes at the other end of your training, try and just have that time to allow the cool down. So maybe a walk on the treadmill or easy five minutes on the bike, or just maybe if you live somewhere where you walk home, walking home from the gym or from the pool is going to be a cool down. But warm-up and cooldown are so, so important for us older athletes to protect us. As I said, we can still train hard, we can still get massive PBs, gain in strength, but it will take a bit longer to get to that point.

SPEAKER_01 20:16

But we can still do just as well. And you are testament, and many of the women on this podcast are testament to that, where we are achieving PBs and things that we never thought we would achieve.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

Achieving goals, goals we'd set that we didn't set. And I think our generation, we're all expected to be working until our late 60s. So it's absolutely imperative we keep ourselves fit and strong. I do a physical job, and I still need to be working at 68. At the moment, I'm obviously doing soft tissue work, I'm swirling around on the floor, I'm carrying heavy bags around. I need to be strong and fit. And if I don't maintain my fitness and strength through exercise and sport that I enjoy, I'm not gonna be able to continue working until I'm 68. And I'm sure that's been that's the same for many of us. And being able to then enjoy retirement, let's face it. And independence, ultimately. Yeah, absolutely. In fact, I was listening to a radio interview already for all about care homes and just the price of care homes and nursing homes when you're growing older. I'm thinking, oh my goodness me, is that coming to us one day? I don't want to ever be in that situation. I want to stay strong. Yeah, and there's a phrase I use which goes alongside that. Everybody won't be elderly at some point, but that doesn't mean you have to be frail. Yeah. And you reduce the risk of being frail if you keep yourself strong and fit. Obviously, that's not now, that's when we're older, but now is the time to stop that. And if you're doing something you enjoy, that's even better. I mean, the thought of going to the gym just for the sake of nothing. I couldn't do it. I know some people like that and like the body image, but for me, it's about the mental well being, the achieving the goals that I've set myself and setting myself up for longevity, I suppose.

SPEAKER_01 21:53

Yeah, definitely. And I think I'm exactly the same. When I started training, I saw the benefits, but that was never what I was going for. And it's just a lovely added extra, really.

SPEAKER_00 22:02

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

So are there any particular exercises that you would recommend that we could incorporate in our workout, especially again as a beginner, transitioning from maybe not doing a movement initially?

SPEAKER_00 22:14

So I think when we talk about different types of movements that we need to be considering, and I'm putting my physio house on here, I think we need to think about the different systems in the body, which I've briefly touched on. So the first one from a movement perspective is our cardiovascular health. So that would be whether it's going for a walk, it could be inside, outside, it could be going on a treadmill, it could be going for a jog, it could be walking the dog. So regular activity where you are keeping your heart rates raised for 30 minutes, that is essential for a healthy heart. Then alongside our cardiovascular health and just general well-being, we've also got the strength side of things, which we've talked about briefly. But we need to think about all the parts of the body. So we've got our large muscle groups and our smaller muscle groups. If we think about our large muscle groups, our legs, so we need to have strong legs to be able to stay upright, to be able to walk, to be able to move, to be able to pick things up and carry things, to be able to stand up from a chair as we get old, all those things. So if we think of large big muscle groups, we're thinking about our quads that are fine muscles and our hamstrings. There's many ways we can build our strength there. We can use our own body weight, just literally doing squats from a chair, for example. So stand and sit down. And that for some people is enough to start with. Some people, even doing that is hard. We can then add in carrying holding weights. There can be, you know, cans of beams to start with, and then we can build up to heavier weights. We can then do things like marching on the spot, holding weights up on our shoulders. All of those things would be ways of building our strength, just generally our lower limbs. We can then go on to using a barbell. So either the big barbell in the gym with the free weights on or things like the Smith machine that sits on a rack and it moves up and down, so that you reduce the risk of being injured. So we could use the fixed weight, so we could do hamstring curls, we could do leg presses in the gym. But I think any form of exercise we think of the gym, we want to think about, you know, unless you're specifically training for one particular thing, you want to think about all our muscle groups. So we don't want to neglect them. But equally, we need to think about what our strengths and weaknesses are. So for some people, they might be aware that actually their upper body is quite weak. So they want to focus more on that. They go, Oh, I'm not very strong. I can never open a jar of jam or something. So we need to think about also our upper bodies. So can you lift a weight up above your head? How many times can you do that? And again, it doesn't have to be something heavy. You could just, I don't know, I'm trying to think something you could use at home. The five-liter bottles of water. Yeah, five liter bottles of water that you have to carry. Yeah, literally up above the head. That is shoulder and arms. Again, biceps curls, so simple things like biceps curls out to the side. So we're just thinking about all the movements that you've been using day-to-day life. And then you can home in more specifically on areas where you feel you are weaker. Another big one is grip strength. Grip strength is a really big indicator of your overall predictor for longevity for life for how long you might live. I can't pull up. I'm determined to be able to do one one day. That's next year's goal. Practing hands, or just literally to start with, literally holding on to the bar and trying to hold your weight with something supporting you underneath. So grip strength is really, really important. You can use kettlebells. There are lots of different glasses out there that people do. So kettlebell glasses or outdoor glasses, whether I use kettlebells. Sometimes some of these more military type glasses will get you carrying jerry cans. So there were so many different ways we can adapt things and change things. It's about what works for you, whether it's indoors, outdoors, whether it's home workout, whether it's an online workout, or whether you want to do it with other people. Yeah, so they're obviously the upper body, lower body. Then the other really important thing that we must not forget is our core. Essentially, our core is our core set of muscles that everything is supported by. We don't want to be having any back problems. If you've done a job where you do lots of bending and lifting, you've had children, lots of people will suffer with back problems. Unfortunately, it's part of life. We sit in chairs, we're quite sedentary in the jobs that a lot of people do. I mean, the one day a week when I do sit, oh my goodness, me, I feel so stiff. So thank goodness I do a job and I'm moving the whole time. But keeping our core strong is so important. And that doesn't mean doing sit-ups. That is thinking about all the muscles that we have at the front, the back, and of course the diaphragm, how well you breathe. So that's where things like yoga come in. So that breathing and supportive breathing and not breath holding is really important too. And then our pelvic health and our pelvic floor, which doing the job I do, I was not going to miss talking about. There's I just have to pelvic floor is bread and butter of a lot of the work I do supporting women, whether they are pregnant and going for the journey to have their first child that they've given birth. Actually, I also treat children. So I even treat children with blabber symptoms. Not unusual for children to get issues with having to maybe they can't last through the night, or when they giggle, they might have a little accident. So pelvic floor starts right at the bottom of our journey, all the way through to the end. And our pelvic health, men and women's, is so important. One of the highest reasons why people are going to care homes is because they're becoming continent and families can't cope with looking after somebody who either doesn't have blank or bowel control and both require pelvic floor strength and support. So pelvic floor health is absolutely integral. So yeah, I mean, I treat men and women, so it's not just women. But yeah, keeping our pelvic floor strong is so, so important. And yeah, I mean, I'd forget to do the exercises if somebody didn't remind me. I teach people to do them, and as I'm teaching them, I'm practicing them myself. There are lots of apps out there that you can use to learn how to do pelvic floor exercises. One that I particularly like is called Squeezy App, and it's $2.99, and that's all you ever have to pay for it. It was originally set up in NHS app, but it's a great starter for people. So I think most people who maybe have had children will have been introduced to pelvic floor exercises. It doesn't mean they do them correctly. So anyone who's maybe had any form of gynecological surgery for whatever reason would also have been introduced to them. But like every other muscle in our body, as we go into perimenopause and menopause, our pelvic floor also may become weaker. So it's really important to keep our pelvic health strong because if you are going to do things like lifting, we need a strong pelvic floor so that we're not putting all that extra pressure on the area and causing other problems that we could then develop. So pelvic floor, do your pelvic floor exercises. And I hope when people listen to podcasts, they'll sit there thinking, right, I must squeeze and lift my pelvic floor.

unknown 28:40

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 28:41

It's one of those things that we like, you say, when you have a child, your first or even your second, or however number of children you've had, you think about it and then you go years without it until yes, we get to a period when it's like, oh yeah, that thing that we're doing.

SPEAKER_00 28:53

Yeah, yeah. And if people are thinking, oh, I had a C-section, I don't need to do pelvic floor exercises. No, you do. Most of the damage to our pelvic floor is done during the nine months when you've got that extra little thing growing inside you. So you are not protected. That's good to really, really important still.

SPEAKER_01 29:11

So as a mid-life athlete and doing all the training that you've done over the years, is there anything that you would talk to us about? As you are sh share with the listeners what your background is with the menopause as well and menopause training.

SPEAKER_00 29:24

So I obviously started off as a pelvic health physio and I worked in a big teaching hospital. So I led the pelvic health team. I'm a prescriber, so it meant that I could prescribe medication. When I first started there, I used to be on the postnatal wards mostly and see all the younger mums. And then as I became old and I was going towards menopause, some of my clients that I had seen in the NHS 20 years earlier, because I was at the same hospital 25 years, were coming back to see me with bladder symptoms, having had 15 years with no issues. I realized I really need to look a little bit more into Talbert's law and its impact through menopause. So I did a couple of courses through the British Menopause Society and started researching into it more. And I think on a selfish note, I also want to know more about it than myself because I didn't want to suffer the impact of menopause. Whilst some people can sail through menopause with no symptoms, other people really, really suffer with it. I reflect now, maybe I have a little bit, but I certainly found going through menopause that one of the biggest things I've been going through is the weight gain. And that's been a big issue for me. It did sort of time when I was doing less exercise, which wasn't good for me because I've always enjoyed sport. The weight just piled on. I was choosing all the wrong foods and not eating a healthy diet either. I think convenience food became a big thing to me. And I started thinking, actually, I'm going through menopause, I've got to keep my body as strong as I can. And if I don't do it now, this is going to be slippery slide downhill. I actually read a book which I'm sure many people here have heard of, called Ultrapress People. And it was actually recommended to me by a very old friend of mine who is a GP. And she said, Charlotte, you need to read this book. Because I said, Oh goodness me, I'm putting on weight and I'm eating really unhealthy. She went, just read this book. I didn't actually read it, I listened to it, and I can tell you I have never put a Pringle in my mouth since I listened to that. And I realised what a huge impact that was having on me as I was getting older, eating ultra-processed food and the impact it was having on my body. And look, I'm no saint. Of course, I love chocolate. I like sweets. I like things that are bad for us, but I have completely changed how I eat and I really think about what now goes into my body. And I'm not a saint about it, but I very rarely eat bread. I've just changed how I think about food. And I don't mean I'll go, well, I can't eat that because it's not a process, but just I try and keep my food types as simple as I can, and my energy levels have been so much better as a result of that. But again, we did talk about this, and I said I would bring it up because I think it has a lot of bad press sometimes around people. I'd put on so much weight and my mental health wasn't in a great place. And I've always been somebody that loves food and I have a huge appetite. And I was pretty sure that I was becoming a bit insulin resistant. I'd have these big sugar crashes in the afternoon, and quite frankly, it's all rubbish. And actually, I had a long conversation with my GP and with a couple of friends as well who are medical. And I did make the decision to go on and dura the injections. I'm talking about it because I think a lot of people will say, Oh, somebody else on the skinny jabs. And that's why I didn't do it to start with. I didn't do it in the way that they suggest where you increase the dose every month. I actually never got up to a maximum dose. I started off in the lowest dose and I gradually built it up. But I think that alongside me completely changing my diet and not eating ultra-processed food, having high protein levels, and basically it took the edge off it. It took the food noise away for me. And I know that sounds like an easy cop-out, but I mentally didn't have the strength. I could not do it on my own. There's so much else going on in my life, navigating menopause, busy family life, just too much going on. I couldn't do it on my own. I needed that extra, I suppose. I hate to use the word crutch, but it definitely also helped because it regulated my insulin and I stopped having crushes. So I was eating three meals a day healthily, not thinking, oh my goodness, we can have something else to eat. Food was always in my brain before and it just was mentally exhausting. And I couldn't maintain that. I'd lost weight before and then it just would all go back on again. But alongside that, I was determined not to be one of those people that people could spot a mile off to bean on. I want to put brackets, skinny jabs. I was doing strength training from the beginning. So right from the beginning, I didn't think, right, I'd just go out and do lots of long runs to get rid of the weight. I strength trained three or four times a week from day one. And I built it up really, really slowly. And I've had people say to me, What? You're on the injections. No, you've got so much muscle. And I'm like, yep, because I've done it the correct way. I haven't just gone, right, well, I'll just eat nothing and then the weight will come up. I've worked really, really hard, but it's taken that food noise away and it's changed my life. I mean, yes, at the beginning I did nausea like other people do, but day to day I'm fit, I'm strong, I'm healthy. And I've recently I did a 360 scan. I don't know if you've had it, the Nico health scan.

SPEAKER_01 34:23

No.

SPEAKER_00 34:23

And it's something you can do that just is your general health. A lot of people, if they work for sort of corporate companies, will get a sort of 360 health check done as part of their company insurance and policies, but I haven't had the option. And I wanted to do it to see how healthy I was. And they do your full cardiovascular health, they do your cholesterol, they do your glucose, they do everything. And when I told them that I was on it, they were slightly shocked and went, No, I can't believe that. And I went, yeah, but I eat really healthily. And then when they looked at my diet, they said, Yeah, I can see why it's worked for you. But I, as I said, I only add it in because I think it's very important people understand that actually, if somebody is in that position, it definitely was the right decision for me. It's not for everybody, of course not. Do I take any supplements alongside it? Again, I don't take hundreds of supplements. The only supplements that I actually take currently are collagen, cannabis, because obviously all my training and I also take magnesium in the evenings just to try and help with sleep and with recovery with my sports. But I don't feel I need to take other supplements because I eat a really balanced, healthy diet and I drink loads of fluid. I am a bit of a coffee addict though.

SPEAKER_01 35:31

So I just wanted to get an understanding. When you said you started strength training at the beginning of taking Manjaro, had you been training a bit before then, or it was at that time you decided to start training again?

SPEAKER_00 35:43

My father lives abroad in Thailand and always makes me laugh his story. We went over to see him for half-term, and his partner's mother lives with them, and she doesn't speak any English, and she hadn't seen me for a year. And we walked into their house and she giggled and turned to my dad's partner and said something. And I turned to my dad and I said, What did she just say? And my dad's partner then translated and went, she said, Oh, you get fat. Now, please understand that was not her being rude in Thailand, and particularly the odd generations, it's seen as healthy, you know. Oh, you know, you've got big, you've got fat. I don't use the word fat, I think that's all translated, but essentially that I was quite big. I was there for the half-term as I said, this is a year and a half ago now. Obviously, I had like a week on holiday there. And while I was there, I'd been toying with anyways, deciding I really had to get back on track and get back doing my sport. And literally, I came back from Thailand and on the 1st of November, I was like, okay, cold turkey off the unhealthy eating, back to the gym. And what happened before is because my boys swim a lot, I am at the sports center every day, about 10 hours a week. And I would sit poolside, basically stuffing my face with crisp and chocolate while they swam. And I went, right, this has got to stop now. And I literally, first November, came back and they were in that pool. And it's like, right, I'd started just started a major and I was like, right, from this moment on, I'm going to the gym. And I did actually get one of the PTs in the gym. I'm a physio. I've got a good understanding, but I just thought I need somebody to just be sensible with me and get me starting slowly. I didn't run a tour to start with because I just was like, I'm so overweight. I wore a big baggy t-shirt and a pair of leggings. Everything's too big, and I had to buy stuff in a size that didn't fit me than before. I've gone up to it for me at 16, and I'm now a size eight. And I've always been, you know, I'm only five foot, so I should be a smaller size. I'm not a tall person, I'm dinky, which always makes me laugh because my doubles partner on high rocks is five foot eleven. So we really are very tall and short. From that moment on, the only cardiovascular stuff I would swim, and I use the elliptical trainer because I didn't want to bring in too much impact. So I got a bit stronger, and I started off just doing really low weights to start with and just gradually built it up. But I weight trained three times a week and built it up until the point now we obviously I'm doing really quite heavy weights in the gym. So yeah, it was a gradual journey from the beginning. But I'm a bit like that. I say all or nothing, but that had to be cut off when I was like, right, this is where I start from.

SPEAKER_01 38:10

So I think I think a lot of these decisions, whether or not you're moving, or as you say, your decision to start the weight loss and move is about making the decision. And sometimes making the decision is the hardest. It's harder than doing the thing. Yeah, yeah, I agree. And I don't know what it is that we can help people make that decision. It's very personal. But for me, I'm similar. And maybe it's something to do with the sport historically as well. But where you just I take a while to get to the decision, but once I've made it, I will stick to it. What would you say it was for you? Well, I think a couple of things.

SPEAKER_00 38:40

First of all, my children were starting to describe me as a bit chubby, which I didn't like. And I've got teenage boys, so you know, I didn't want to be that mum sitting on the side of the pool and everything exercise. Secondly, I did use to travel before that, and I was always one of the mums that people saw as being strong and healthy. And I had become not strong and not healthy. And I was like, oh my goodness me, I am not turning into a middle-aged blob. I need to get myself back on track again. And I think the third thing is I'm a bit of a dopamine addict, if I'm really honest, but my dopamine addiction has actually always been sport over anything else. I've never taken anything illegal, not interested, even when I was in university and people maybe did, I just wasn't interested in it. The university, I enjoyed a good drink. But now honestly, I can take it or leave it. Give me chocolate or coffee, but I like a genotonic and I like a glass of wine, but I might have it once a month. It's not a big deal for me. Life's too busy and I drive and I work, so I don't really have an option on that one. And so for me, once I get back into it, I just love that feeling of feeling healthy and that buzz and that dopamine hit. And at this time of year, it's harder in the winter, definitely, to keep yourself motivated when it's dark and cold. At this time of year, it's a bit easier. Like tomorrow morning, my boys will be swimming at six o'clock. Now, in the winter, I would just go in the gym. At this time of year, I'll go for a run then and do my gym session in the evening. And just being outside in the fresh air, hearing the birds fruiting. I know I'm being a bit cliche, but it's true. Oh, it's beautiful in the morning, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 40:07

In the summer.

SPEAKER_00 40:09

Watching the sunrise and yeah, not making the mistake I made the other day, not where I think it was four degrees, and I went out and a sleeve, a stopping and a pair of shorts, and I literally couldn't feel my fingers. So Yeah, because you see the sunlight, you get happy, you're like, yes, let's go.

unknown 40:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:22

Forgot a jumper, a bit cold. Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 40:25

So what does your training look like with everything that you're doing with your high rocks training and getting back into everything 18 months?

SPEAKER_00 40:31

So funnily enough, I was just talking to a friend of mine the other day. I'm probably at the point now where I would quite like to have a coach to help me really make those extra gains. But until this point in the last 18 months, I've done all my own training programs. And I try and have a balance of strength training three times a week, of which two will be specific strength training, maybe one upper body, one lower body, and then one that I'd call hybrid strength. So it will be strength training, but it will also have some cardiovascular stuff in with it. So doing a bit of a strength training under fatigue, which case in with high rocks and hybrid fitness. So for instance, I may do some farmer's carries or some Bulgarian squats, say eight on each leg, and then I'll go on the treadmill and run 400 metres and then go back and do something else. It doesn't necessarily have to be a high rocks strength movement, but some form of strength work alternating with some running or the rower or the skier because that you're doing some strength training under fatigue that obviously transfers into what you need to do for the races. But two of the sessions will always be specific strength, functional strength I'll do tonight, which will just be weights. I'll always, at least a couple of times a week, try and add in a bit of core work as well. That's often at the end of a session, maybe only five, 10 minutes, keeping my core nice and strong. So not just my abs, but my obliques and making sure that that's all keeping my back strong as well, because I don't want to then get a back injury. And I have in the past had a bit of back pain again when I was unfit and not very strong. And then I'll always make sure, really important is the older athlete. The running is a huge part of hybrid fitness, and we need to do more running than we realise, but a lot of that running can be easy. And when I say easy, that's zone two run. So you can have a full conversation as you're running. What I tend to do is I usually do a short, easy run during the week on one of my early morning when the boys are swimming sessions. I'll go out for half an hour, 40 minutes, do a six to eight K run. And then at the weekend, I'll do a long, easy run or a long, easy bike, actually, because I've used to run a bike all the time. So I'll either go out an hour and a half on the bike or I'll go for an hour, really easy run. So that's not so easy around me because everything's hilly, but really keep your pace down and feel like you're almost having to pull back on the run. And then I'll try and fit in one other session a week, which is interval training, which I'd quite like to start doing on the track. But at the moment, I do mostly on treadmill just because it's simple. So that would be sessions where I'm trying to improve my speed endurance. So yeah, so I probably run specific one sessions three times a week and then do sort of three to four strengthslash hybrid mix and then a hybrid strength within that. So I do train most days, but one of the days will be what I would describe as an active recovery day, because for me, I would rather have an active recovery rest day than a true rest day. And that's okay. You can do that if that's the kind of person you are. That would be taking my dogs for a walk, for example, or maybe going out for a really easy bike ride or going for a swim.

unknown 43:29

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 43:29

So I used to swim a lot, and again, I don't swim so much now because obviously you can't do everything. There's only so many hours in a day and a job. So yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 43:38

Oh, that's been brilliant. Thank you so much, Charlotte. So before we wrap up, I'm gonna ask you the question that I ask everybody in a word or two, what does movement mean to you?

SPEAKER_00 43:48

Movement means I think for me, happiness, longevity, and friends.

SPEAKER_01 43:55

Oh, yes, I love that. And you are testament to all of that with the community. And everything that you've spoken about today. So I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for sharing everything that you've shared, because I know that it's quite sensitive and very private. So I know it will be really helpful for a lot of listeners. So thank you so much again. My pleasure. Thank you. And before you go, where can people find out more about you?

SPEAKER_00 44:18

So I do have a website which is made of my animal physiod, but obviously you can go on to that, which is www.thelionclinic.com. The actual website is mostly my veterinary physio, but it's got my email address they can access and also on my Instagram handle as well. Menopausephysio.trirox mum. So it kind of gives away the fact that I'm a menopause physio and I do triathlon and I do high rocks and I'm a mum.

SPEAKER_01 44:47

I love that trirox mum. I've never heard of that before. That makes sense. And thank you again, Charlotte.

SPEAKER_00 44:52

My pleasure. Take care.